Walter Skinner
Walter Sergei Skinner (Mitch Pileggi) was an Assistant Director within the FBI. One of the sections under his control was the X-Files. He was previously a member of the United States Army. (TXF: "Tooms") History Supervising the X Files Scully was the first of the agents to meet Skinner. At this first meeting, Skinner seemed to defer to Cigarette Smoking Man when he berated Scully about her and Mulder's unorthodox investigation methods. This lead to them both being suspicious of Skinner's motives and loyalties. (TXF: "Tooms") Over time, Skinner proved his loyalty to Mulder and Scully and their work. He first demonstrated this by going against the Cigarette Smoking Man and trying to use the digital tape Mulder had received from "the Thinker" as leverage to get Mulder and Scully reinstated. He even promised that if they didn't honor that deal, he would risk his life and go state's evidence and testify against them. Unfortunately, Krycek beat up Skinner and stole the tape. However, Skinner pulled a master stroke and told the Cigarette Smoking Man that Albert Hosteen had memorized everything on the tape and, in the ancient oral tradition of his people, had shared it with 20 other men. If anything happened to Mulder or Scully, he was prepared to recite everything in the files and, unless CSM wanted to killed every Navajo living in four states, he must reinstate Mulder and Scully. (TXF: "Paper Clip") There were times when Skinner was unable to help Mulder. When Mulder was investigating the case of the alien autopsy in Allentown, Skinner told him he was on his own. He also warned him that the case was bigger than either of them or the FBI and that Mulder should exploit any other sources he had. (TXF: "Nisei") However, Skinner always had Mulder's safety at heart. When Mulder became much too involved in a case involving gargoyles that John Mostow claimed had possessed him, Skinner told Scully he was as concerned as she was about Mulder's increasingly erratic behavior. (TXF: "Grotesque") In 1996, Skinner was sorry to have to tell Scully that the investigation into her sister's death had been made inactive. Scully was understandably angry and upset about this and Skinner told her he would appeal the decision and go over the evidence himself. Later, Skinner was warned by three MIBs that he should know that, as an employee of the FBI, he, like those under him, was supposed to obey orders and that, if those above him had decided that there was nothing more to pursue in Melissa Scully's case, who was he to question that decision. Skinner, however, did not relent and he was shot by Luis Cardinal, the same man who had killed Melissa Scully. Since Skinner survived the shooting, Luis Cardinal later tried to kill him again when he was being tranferred to another hospital. A tip given to Mulder by the Well-Manicured Man Scully to be there to stop Luis Cardinal. She chased him down and he was arrested by the police. Mulder was very grateful to Skinner for risking his life and job to help Scully in her pursuit of her sister's killer. (TXF: "Piper Maru", "Apocrypha") A Personal X-File When Skinner was in the United States Marine Corps in Vietnam, he and his unit were ambushed by the enemy and everyone, including Skinner, went down. As he lay dying, he watched the Viet Cong take his weapon and he stayed there during the night outside his body in the jungle, watching himself and his comrade's dead bodies. When they came and found him dead, they put him in a body bag and Skinner assumed they must have found a pulse as he woke up two weeks later in hospital. (TXF: "One Breath") The day Skinner was asked yet again to sign his divorce papers, he went for a drink after work and ended up in bed with what turned out to be a prostitute. While he was having sex with her, he hallucinated that an old woman with long grey hair was on top of him. Later, he woke up to find the prostitute dead. Skinner continued to have sightings of the old woman. Skinner's wife, Sharon, was attacked by the men who seemed to be setting Skinner up and Mulder surmised that maybe the grey haired woman was trying to protect Skinner. He came to this conclusion after Skinner told him about how the grey haired woman had stayed with him while he was floating in the jungle in Vietnam; that she had "carried him back, away from the light". (TXF: "Avatar") Appearances TXF: * "Tooms" (Season 1) * "Little Green Men" (Season 2) * "The Host" * "Sleepless" * "Ascension" * "One Breath" * "Colony" * "End Game" * "F. Emasculata" * "Anasazi" * "The Blessing Way" (Season 3) * "Paper Clip" * "Nisei" * "Grotesque" * "Piper Maru" * "Apocrypha" * "Pusher" * "Avatar" * "Wetwired" * "Talitha Cumi" * "Herrenvolk" (Season 4) * "Teliko" * "The Field Where I Died" * "Tunguska" * "Terma" * "Paper Hearts" * "El Mundo Gira" * "Memento Mori" * "Unrequited" * "Max" * "Small Potatoes" * "Zero Sum" * "Redux" (Season 5) * "Redux II" * "Kitsunegari" * "Bad Blood" * "The Red and the Black" * "The Pine Bluff Variant" * "Folie a Deux" * "The End" * "The Beginning" (Season 6) * "Triangle" * "S.R. 819" * "Two Fathers" * "One Son" * "Monday" * "Field Trip" * "Biogenesis" * "The Sixth Extinction" (Season 7) * "The Sixth Extinction II: Amor Fati" * "Millennium" * "Sein Und Zeit" * "En Ami" * "Chimera" * "Brand X" * "Hollywood AD" * "Je Souhaite" * "Requiem" * "Within" (Season 8) * "Without" * "Via Negativa" * "The Gift" * "Per Manum" * "This is Not Happening" * "DeadAlive" * "Three Words" * "Vienen" * "Alone" * "Essence" * "Existence" * "Nothing Important Happened Today" (Season 9) * "Nothing Important Happened Today II" * "4-D" * "John Doe" * "Provenance" * "Providence" * "Jump the Shark" * "William" * "Sunshine Days" * "The Truth" TLG: * "The Lying Game" Skinner, Walter